NOTICE TO CONTRIBUTORS

Notice to Contributors

Thank you for considering Species Diversity for the publication of your research. This section provides comprehensive guidelines for manuscript preparation and submission. Please review the relevant pages below to ensure your submission meets our editorial standards.

Contents

• Cover Letter

• Exceptions

• Title page
• Abstract
• Key Words
• Introduction
• Materials and Methods
• Results
• Discussion
• End-of-Article Sections

- Data Availability Statement
- Acknowledgments / Acknowledgements
- Authors' Contributions
- Funding
- Declarations (Competing interests, Ethics)

• References
• Tables
• Figures
• Digital image files
• Figure legends
• Abbreviations and units
• Scientific names
• Others

The Article Processing Charge (APC) and Other Charges

Submissions from outside Japan

    The Article Processing Charge (APC) is 5,000 Japanese yen (JPY), and by paying the APC you will receive membership in the JSSZ until December of the current year. During this time, you can submit as many articles as you like without paying any page charges. At least one JSSZ member must be among the authors of any submitted manuscript. Of course, all papers in this journal are open access.

Submissions from within Japan

    At least one JSSZ member must be among the authors of any submitted manuscript. From 2023 the annual membership dues are 8,000 JPY, which includes subscriptions to both "Species Diversity" the Japanese serial "TAXA ".

Page Charges

    There are no page charges for articles printed in black and white, and the only PDF version is in color. There are no page charges for papers printed in black and white, but the charges to have the figures appear in color in the printed versions are 5,000 JPY + tax per printed color page. 

    Please see the Purchasing section of "Contact us".

Application for Membership

    For Application for Membership and the payment of Annual Membership Dues, please see the Purchasing section of "Contact us" and the page of "The Japanese Society of Systematic Zoology".

Submission of Manuscripts 

    Authors should submit manuscripts by e-mail to the Editorial Committee (species_diversity@jssz.sakura.ne.jp). The manuscripts are to be sent as attachment files; down-sized image files for FIGURES and spreadsheet files for TABLES should be unified with the text into a single MS Word document. The document size should not exceed 10 MB. If you have problems in reducing the file size, ask to the Editor before the file is sent by e-mail.

Cover Letter

    In addition, be sure to include the following four statements in your cover letter. The details are also to be clearly stated in the Competing interests and/or Ethics in the Declarations section of the manuscript.

1. All authors have agreed to submit the manuscript, and the corresponding author has received permission from the co-author(s). Please also state each author's contributions to the work in the Authors Contributions section.

2. This article has not previously been published and is not concurrently being considered for publication elsewhere.

3. The article does not infringe on the copyright or other proprietary rights of any person or entity and does not contain abusive, defamatory, obscene, fraudulent, or otherwise unlawful statements of any kind.

4. The authors declare that they have no known conflicts of interest that may have influenced the work reported in this article. If, in fact, any conflicts of interest exist, they must be specified here in place of this statement.

Manuscript submission address

E-mail address of the Editorial Committee: species_diversity@jssz.sakura.ne.jp

Data Sharing Policy

Species Diversity encourages authors to make data and supporting materials available to readers in accordance with the FAIR Data Principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable), by depositing them in an appropriate public repository. All submissions must include a Data Availability Statement in the End-of-Article Sections. The statement must do at least one of the following:

1) Provide persistent links to the repository record(s) where the data are deposited.

2) List the relevant identifiers for deposited data (e.g., accession numbers in DDBJ/GenBank/ENA or DOIs for deposited datasets or repository-hosted supplementary files).

3) Explicitly state that no additional data are available beyond what is included in the published article (e.g., "All data are included in the published article").

   See the "End-of-Article Sections" in this "Notice to Contributors" for details.

   Exceptions: If data cannot be shared publicly due to legal or ethical restrictions (e.g., sensitive information, third-party rights, or conservation concerns such as precise locality data for rare or threatened species), the Data Availability Statement must clearly explain the reason and describe how qualified readers may access the data, where feasible (e.g., via a controlled- access repository, upon reasonable request, or through an authorized data custodian).

    Please also refer to Section 6. Data and Supporting Materials in the "Ethics and Disclosures" on this journal's website.

Style of Manuscripts

    Manuscripts should be prepared with a word processor, which is compatible with MS Word. The entire manuscript, including references, should be typed double-spaced, with margins of at least 30 mm. All pages should be numbered consecutively in the bottom center.

    Manuscripts must be written in English. Spelling should be either British or American (current usage), but must be consistent throughout the manuscript. In general, the recommendations of Scientific Style and Format: the CBE Manual for Authors, Editors, and Publishers (Cambridge University Press 1994) should be followed. Authors not writing in their first language are asked to have manuscripts checked for grammar and syntax before submission. Manuscripts should be written so that they are intelligible to the professional reader who is not a specialist in the particular field. Manuscripts which do not conform to these requirements may be returned to the author prior to review for correction. The manuscript should be presented in the following order:

• Title page: This should contain the title of the contribution and the name(s) and address(es) of the author(s). The full postal address, telephone number and email address of the author who will receive correspondence and check the proofs should be included, as well as the present address of any author if different from that where the work was carried out. The main title should, where possible, contain the major key words used in the body of the manuscript; the title should include the class/phylum designation when a generic or specific name is used but should not contain authorities for scientific names. A short running title (less than 60 characters including spaces) should also be provided.

• Abstract: All manuscripts must include a brief but informative Abstract, intelligible without reference to the main text. It should not exceed 300 words and should describe the scope of the work and the main findings. The names of organisms used (including authorities) should be given. References to literature should not be included.

• Key Words: Key words (3–10) should be provided below the Abstract to assist with the indexing of the article.

• Introduction: This section should include sufficient background information to set the work in context. The aims of the manuscript should be clearly stated. The Introduction should not contain either findings or conclusions.

• Materials and Methods: This should be concise but provide sufficient detail to allow the work to be repeated by others. The source of material should be given in detail, where possible.

• Results: Results should be presented in a logical sequence in the text, tables, and figures; repetitive presentation of the same data in different forms should be avoided. The results should not contain material appropriate to the Discussion.

• Discussion: This should consider the Results in relation to any hypotheses advanced in the Introduction and place the study in the context of other work. In purely descriptive manuscripts, Materials and Methods, Results, and, if necessary, Discussion may be combined.

• End-of-Article Sections: The following sections must appear after the main text and before the References. It is the authors' responsibility to obtain written permission to quote material that has appeared in another publication. Please also refer to the specific examples below, the Data Sharing Policy section and the "Ethics and Disclosures" section on this journal's website:

Formatting reference
"End-of-Article Sections Format"

• Data Availability Statement. [Choose one or more of the following as appropriate].

- The data supporting this study are openly available in [Repository Name(s)] at [DOIs] as Supplementary Information, below.

- The sequences used in this study have been deposited in DDBJ/GenBank/ENA under the accession numbers referred to in the text.

- All data supporting the findings of this study are included in the published article.

- Data are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request, owing to [reason, e.g., privacy, or ethical restrictions].

Supplementary Figure 1. Approximate ranges of Nipponorchestia curvatus, Nipponorchestia nudiramus, and Mizuhorchestia urospina. Available at https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare... .

Supplementary Data 1. Multi-Fasta file containing the aligned sequences of 16S rRNA for the present phylogenetic analyses. Available at https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare... .

• Acknowledgments: Technical assistance, including proper evidence of the correct compliance of the ABS regulation, may be acknowledged here:

    We thank Ingrid Nyström (Faculty of Environmental and Biological Sciences, University of Meridia) for providing specimens and valuable information on T. guijoensis, and Ting-Wen Lai (National Taiwan University) for permission to use his photograph. We are grateful to Jim Goldschmidt (Department of Ecology, Brandenburg University of Technology) for advice on DNA sequencing. We also thank Lukas Hartmann for taking and providing photographs of the fish. We thank Edanz (https://jp.edanz.com/) and Enago (Crimson Interactive Japan Co., Ltd.; https://www.enago.jp/) for English language editing of this manuscript.
   We sincerely thank the National Biodiversity Center of Aurelia for granting the research permit (Permit No. 930257) and approving the material transfer (PSC No. TDH/TP/33).

• Author Contributions: Information about individual contributions to the work is provided here. The corresponding author is responsible for ensuring that the contributions of all authors are accurate. The contribution statements should follow CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy; https://credit.niso.org/):

    John Smith: Conceptualization; Resources; Investigation; Formal analysis; Visualization; Writing – original draft. Taro Yamada: Conceptualization; Supervision; Resources; Investigation; Writing – original draft; Writing – review & editing; Project administration; Funding acquisition.

• Funding: Details of funding sources for all authors, including grant numbers, should be provided in this section. If no specific funding was provided for the research, the following statement should be made here:

    This research was supported by research funds of the JSSZ Foundation for JB, as well as by the JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 25K06399 to RM and EAM.

   This research has not received any specific grant from any funding agency, commercial or not-for-profit sector.

• Declarations: A declaration of competing interests should be provided here. If there is no conflict of interest, the following statement should be included:

Competing interests. The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Ethics. The animals used in this study were treated in accordance with the Regulation on Animal Experimentation under the permission numbers XXXX, YYYY.

• References: In the text, references should be made by giving the author's name with the year of publication in parentheses, not separated by a comma. If there are two authors, use "and" to link authors' names in all cases. When reference is made to a work by three or more authors, the first name followed by "et al." should be used on all occasions. If several manuscripts by the same author(s) and from the same year are cited, a, b, c, etc. should be put after the year of publication. Within parentheses, groups of references should be cited in chronological order, separated by semicolons [e.g., (Nakano 2010, 2014; Nakano and Lai 2012)]. Sources of authorities of any scientific names used in the manuscript should not be included in the References, except for those used in headings and in synonym lists; when desired, explicit citations of such sources may be made separately or by appending "(q.v.)" to the source. References should be listed in alphabetical order of the first author, the number of co-authors and the date of publication at the end of the manuscript, in the following form. For two-author references with the same first author, they are listed in alphabetical order by the second author. For three-or-more-author references with the same first author, they are ordered only by the date of publication. If given, the DOI should be specified.

   For papers and books with original titles written in a Roman-alphabet language:

    Papers including nomenclature acts (including proposals for new scientific names) with different publication years of printed publications and electronic publications should be listed in the following form (the electronic "Version of Record" of the below paper was published in 2016, and then the paper was paginated in 2017):

    For electronic references:

     For papers and books with no original title written in a Roman-alphabet language, translated titles in square brackets should be provided, and for books, transliterated titles as well:

    Titles of journals should not be abbreviated; those not written in the Roman alphabet should be transliterated, not translated.

• Tables: Tables must be typed on separate sheets. They should be numbered consecutively in Arabic numerals with a descriptive title above the table. Column headings should be brief, with units of measurement in parentheses. Use superscript letters (not numbers) for footnotes and keep footnotes to a minimum. Vertical lines should not be used to separate columns. The approximate positions of tables should be indicated in the margin of the manuscript.

• Figures: Illustrations, photographs and graphic charts are classified as figures, instead of plates, and should be numbered consecutively. Photographs must fit within the single column (85 mm) or full text width (177 mm) and should be no more than 253 mm in height. Line figures should be drawn or grouped to fit these dimensions after reduction. A scale bar must be included for all photographs, with the scale indicated above or beside the bar.

• Digital image files can be submitted as e-mail attachments. Although various types of file formats, including TIFF, JPG, GIF, PICT, BMP, or AI, are acceptable for the Printing Company, it is recommended that authors produce files in EPS format, prepared with Adobe® Photoshop or Adobe® Illustrator. When an analogue original artwork (hand-drawn line art, 35 mm reversal film, or black-and-white photographs) is to be scanned, the required minimal scanning resolutions are: 1200 dpi for line drawings: 266 dpi for black-and-white photographs; 800 dpi for combined line drawings and black-and-white photographs; 350 dpi for color photographs; and 600 dpi for combined line drawings and color photographs. Authors producing figures digitally should consider the above resolutions throughout the preparation process.

• Figure legends: Legends should be self-explanatory and typed on separate sheets. The legend should incorporate definitions of any symbols used. The approximate positions of figures should be indicated in the margin of the manuscript.

• Abbreviations and units: SI units (meter, kilogram, etc.) should be used wherever possible. Statistics and measurements should always be given in figures; that is, 10 mm except where the number begins the sentence. Confusing mathematical notation, particularly subscripts and superscripts, should be avoided; negative exponents are acceptable as long as they are used consistently. Use only standard abbreviations. The word "Figure/Figures" should be shortened to Fig./Figs unless starting a sentence.

• Scientific names: The scientific name should be given for every animal with authority and date when first mentioned (for a botanical name, authority only).  The generic name may be abbreviated to an initial in subsequent references except where intervening references to other genera would cause confusion. Common names of organisms, if used, must be accompanied by the correct scientific name when first mentioned.

• Others: The following instructions should be adhered to when manuscripts are prepared with word-processing software:

1. Do not use a carriage return (enter) at the end of lines within a paragraph.

2. Use only one space after punctuation marks.

3. The text should be left-aligned (i.e., unjustified) except for the title page and headings.

4. Do not use end-of-line hyphenation, except in the case of compound words.

5. Use italics where appropriate, not underlining.

6. Use the page footer function; do not insert page numbers in the text.

7. Distinguish a hyphen, an n-dash, and an m-dash.
   

Checklist

    Check the following before submission: (1) all references cited in the text are included in the reference section; (2) all figures and tables are cited in the text, in numerical order; and (3) the reference section is in proper format.

Zoobank Registration

    The Editorial Committee will register accepted manuscripts with nomenclatural acts in ZooBank before publication and the LSIDs will be indicated on the first page of each published paper. The authors need not register their publications and nomenclatural acts in ZooBank.

Proofs and Offprints

    Page proofs only will be sent to the corresponding author and they should be returned to the Editor within 3 days of receipt. Alterations to the text and illustrations are unacceptable at the proof stage (except for the correction of printer's errors) and authors will be charged for changes from their original manuscript.

    When the article is published online, the corresponding author receives email confirmation of publication and access to their article.

    An offprint order form giving the cost of offprints will be sent to the corresponding author with the proofs. The order form should be returned with the corrected proofs. 

PDF file of "Notice to Contributors" (Revised on January 13, 2026)

For questions not addressed here, please contact the Editorial Committee
( species_diversity@jssz.sakura.ne.jp ).

Notice to Contributors top